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Edward Taylor
Edward Taylor (circa 1642 – June 29, 1729) was an English-born American preacher, poet, and physician whose ministry and writings made him a significant figure in colonial Puritanism. Born in Sketchley, Leicestershire, England, to William, a yeoman farmer, and Margaret Taylor, he grew up in a Nonconformist family during the Commonwealth period. After losing both parents—his mother in 1657 and father in 1658—he worked as a schoolmaster until the 1662 Act of Uniformity barred him from teaching due to his refusal to conform to the Church of England. In 1668, he emigrated to Massachusetts Bay Colony, enrolling at Harvard College in 1671, where he graduated with a divinity degree. Taylor’s preaching career began when he accepted a call in 1671 to serve as minister in Westfield, Massachusetts, a frontier town he led for over 50 years. His sermons, over 60 of which survive, emphasized God’s grace and the believer’s relationship with Christ, reflecting his role in administering communion and defending orthodox Congregationalism against liberalizing trends like those of Solomon Stoddard. Alongside preaching, he wrote over 200 Preparatory Meditations, poetic reflections on Scripture, though he forbade their publication, and they remained unknown until 1937. Married twice—first to Elizabeth Fitch in 1674, who bore eight children before her death in 1689, then to Ruth Willys in 1692, with whom he had six—he died at age 87 in Westfield, leaving a legacy as a devoted pastor and one of America’s earliest literary voices.
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Edward Taylor preaches about the joy and praise of the saints who are on their journey to Heaven in Christ's Coach, singing sweet melodies of worship and offering their hearts in divine acts. Those who are not in the Coach yet are like travelers on foot, tracing the road to eventually join in the heavenly singing and ride to glory.
The Joy of Church Fellowship Rightly Attended
In Heaven soaring up, I dropt an Eare On Earth: and oh! sweet Melody! And listening, found it was the Saints who were Encoacht for Heaven that sang for Joy. For in Christs Coach they sweetly sing, As they to Glory ride therein. Oh! joyous hearts! Enfir'de with holy Flame! Is speech thus tasseled with praise? Will not your inward fire of Joy contain, That it in open flames doth blaze? For in Christs Coach Saints sweetly sing, As they to Glory ride therein. And if a string do slip by Chance, They soon Do screw it up again: whereby They set it in a more melodious Tune And a Diviner Harmony. For in Christs Coach they sweetly sing, As they to Glory ride therein. In all their Acts, publick and private, nay, And secret too, they praise impart. But in their Acts Divine, and Worship, they With Hymns do offer up their Heart. Thus in Christs Coach they sweetly sing, As they to Glory ride therein. Some few not in; and some whose Time and Place Block up this Coaches way, do goe As Travellers afoot: and so do trace The Road that gives them right thereto; While in this Coach these sweetly sing, As they to Glory ride therein.
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Edward Taylor (circa 1642 – June 29, 1729) was an English-born American preacher, poet, and physician whose ministry and writings made him a significant figure in colonial Puritanism. Born in Sketchley, Leicestershire, England, to William, a yeoman farmer, and Margaret Taylor, he grew up in a Nonconformist family during the Commonwealth period. After losing both parents—his mother in 1657 and father in 1658—he worked as a schoolmaster until the 1662 Act of Uniformity barred him from teaching due to his refusal to conform to the Church of England. In 1668, he emigrated to Massachusetts Bay Colony, enrolling at Harvard College in 1671, where he graduated with a divinity degree. Taylor’s preaching career began when he accepted a call in 1671 to serve as minister in Westfield, Massachusetts, a frontier town he led for over 50 years. His sermons, over 60 of which survive, emphasized God’s grace and the believer’s relationship with Christ, reflecting his role in administering communion and defending orthodox Congregationalism against liberalizing trends like those of Solomon Stoddard. Alongside preaching, he wrote over 200 Preparatory Meditations, poetic reflections on Scripture, though he forbade their publication, and they remained unknown until 1937. Married twice—first to Elizabeth Fitch in 1674, who bore eight children before her death in 1689, then to Ruth Willys in 1692, with whom he had six—he died at age 87 in Westfield, leaving a legacy as a devoted pastor and one of America’s earliest literary voices.